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| I was really sympathetic to this guy at first, but got less so as he went on by blackwater 11/03/2019, 11:27am PST | ||||
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| Procrastination, getting in over your head-- we can all sympathize with that.
But as I read more and more, I just kept getting the feeling that he didn't really like writing. He wanted to be a novelist, but "didn't really like novels" (his own words). It kind of feels like the kid who wanted to be a pilot, but didn't want to deal with all those knobs and switches, and checklists. Well, I mean... then you don't really want to be a pilot. So really what he learned was something about himself. But then... he blames capitalism for all his problems. This just seems really weird to me. I mean, there is no other time in history when it has been easier to write something and get people to read it, due to computers, the internet, etc. Writing the next great American novel doesn't require you to be Scrooge McDuck. You could just be a guy with a shitty old laptop from 2000 and a copy of MS Word. Of course, it's still hard to make the New York Times bestseller list or be a famous novelist, but that doesn't have anything to do with capitalism either. In any society, there are only a few super-popular authors and a few gatekeepers for them. If we could somehow get a time machine and give all these people whining about "capitalism" a trip to the USSR circa 1970 for a few months, the world would be a much better place, with a lot fewer illusions. I'm sympathetic to people who get exploited or strung along by people promising payment for creative work, and not delivering it. Jonesy, I remember you posted a bunch of essays by a Hollywood writer about that topic. But this is kind of the opposite. This guy promised he would be able to deliver and essay and then failed to deliver at the last minute. Admittedly, this isn't as bad, and it sounds like this Thor guy was kind of a fuckup as well (for trusting him!) But this still deserves more than the passive-aggressive sorry-not-sorry this guy delivers. Also, personally, I think writing an essay from a point of view you don't agree with is a useful exercise. A writer who can't do that is like an actor who can only play a single character. |
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Stephen Bond on writing for a commission by 11/02/2019, 1:31pm PDT  I was really sympathetic to this guy at first, but got less so as he went on by 11/03/2019, 11:27am PST Re: I was really sympathetic to this guy at first, but got less so as he went on by 11/04/2019, 7:17am PST I’m not normally a JP fan, but this guy needed some Jordan Peterson by 11/05/2019, 3:26pm PST I like his take on Oblivion. by 11/04/2019, 10:35am PST |
